Psychology: Challenging Questions

AO1

• Beck - Cognitive Behavioural Therapy
  • challenge the negative triad of the world, self and future
  • set future goals
• Ellis - Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
  • break the irrational thought-depression bond
  • combats Ellis' ABC(DE) model
• homework - prediction, and learning from a situation (to combat their thought processes)

AO3

• March - 81, 81, 86%
• does not allow the patient to look into their past/childhood
• costly - strain on NHS (drugs are much cheaper)
• no negative biological side effects for therapy
• real problems (e.g unemployment) will not be solved with CBT
• depression causes lack of activity (no motivation to travel out to therapy)

• consistency
  • diachronic and synchronic
  • ability to believe in your opinion over time and with your peers
• flexibility
  • allow opinion to change slightly to not seem too rigid
• commitment
  • display good arguments 
  • extreme activities

AO1

• each study was 8 stages, 3 minutes each
• 100 middle class 1-2 year old babies
• proximity, exploration and secure base, stranger anxiety, separation anxiety, reunion
• looked for exploratory, searching and emotive behaviours 
• secure = accept comfort, some exploring, mild anxiety
• insecure-resistance = reject comfort, clings to mother, major anxiety
• insecure-avoidant = explore with no problem, no reunion response, no anxiety

AO3

• inethical
• small sample of varying ages
• Takahashi - procedures not generalisable to Japan, as mothers always rushed to babies
• focus only on mother - what about the father?
• subjective - looking at babies' (possibly unconscious) movements; some babies may not be physcially as able to move as other babies
• Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonberg - lots of cross-cultural research

AO1

• Braver = central executive research
  • harder activities put more of a strain on the pre-frontal cortex
• Eslinger = damage to the central executive has different effects - more complex
• Larsen = phonological loop; found that words sounding similar were vulneravle to phonological similarity effect
• Baddeley = visuo-spatial sketchpad; participants struggled with describing the angles of the letter F, whilst also tracking a pointer (can not use the same slave system)

A03

• small/unrepeated studies
• use fMRIs/brain scanning techniques
• little known about WMM - episodic buffer only recently added (uncertainty)
• better than multistore model
• studies are supported by case studies that are of people with brain defects, etc

AO1

• created the first official psychology lab in Germany
• psychology became an observable, testable science
• formulated introspection - study your own brains (break it down into components)
• experience analysed in terms of its components (feelings, thoughts
• allowed the development of cognitive neuroscience
• reductionism and structuralism
• Watson (behaviourism) claimed it was too vague

AO3

• holistic
• not repeatable/generalisable
• founding father of psychology
• reductionist - underexplains all other approaches
• supported by Griffith - who studied gamblers' fruit machine reactions using introspection

AO1

• no instincts, all behaviours are learned
• Watson, Skinner Pavlov
• Watson rejected introspection as being too vague
• classical conditioning - Pavlov's dog
• both animals and humans learn in the same way, and build up a reinforcement history
• operant conditioning - Skinner's box (rats)

AO3

• reductionist
• SLT is better
• deterministic (but relatively unfalsifiable)
• inethical animal studies (never done on humans due to ethics)
• ungeneralisable to humans  - underestimates human cognitions and free will

• essentialises the differences between 2 groups
• e.g males and females or different cultures
• can form extremist political statements
• marginalise minorities/works against equality
• helps to understand the differences between 2 groups
• can lead into ethnocentrism

AO1

• testing a larger sample of offenders
• sampling to give representativeness; eg. random sampling of target population
• testable hypothesis
• taking a nomothetic approach would involve collection of a large amount of data
• analysis = quantitative methods, eg statistical testing
• drawing of conclusions in relation to a wider population - formulation of general laws

AO3

• idiographic allows more indepth research
• statistics trivialise people's real problems
• predictive power in statistics
• good for meta-analysis
• complementarity with idiography gives a better investigation

AO1

• spiral model (Heatherton and Polivy) - low self esteem -> multiple attempts -> disinhibition
  • failure + link to self-deficiency
• ironic processes (Wegner) - trying not to think about foods leads to a paradoxical outcome
  • takes a lot of cognitive energy to distract yourswelf (impossible to maintain)
• resitriction, disinhibition and the boundary model (Herman and Polivy)
• attention to detail (Redden)
• psychological factors - behavioural model, no denial, not as a reward, new identity

AO3

• takes cognitive, biological and social factors into account (not reductionist)
• doesn't explain whether anorexia is a success or failure of dieting
• some diets work
• link to dieting schemes
• ability to stick to a diet may be linked to locus of control
• ironic processes study is not directly generalisable
• attention to detail may become unhealthy

• developed by Wundt
• systematic method used to study the mind
• break up conscious awareness into basic structures: thought, images, sensations...
• structualism and reductionism

imitation

• copying the behaiours of others

identification

• observer associates themselves with a role model
• wants to be like the role model

modelling

• imitating the behaviour of a role model
• precise demondtration ofa specific behaviour that can be imitated

• vast store of biological drives and instincts
• spans the id, ego and super ego
• stores dark and disturbing thoughts and memories that have been repressed or forgotten
  • such as violent or sexual abuse as a child

similarities

• both focus on natures (genes vs. instincts)
• both are reductionist
• both are deterministic

differences

• psychodynamic approach focuses on childhood (environemntal) development
• psychodynamic is unfalsifiable (not a true science)
• psychodynamic is idiographic, not nomothetic

• look inside youself to break down your mind
• where addiction is coming from (what caused it, where is it localised)
• Griffiths studied gamblers with fruit machines
  • gamblers made more regular and more irrational verbalisations
  • gamblers were better skill-orientated to play the machines, or at least thought they were

• the cognitive interview
• better than standard
  • report everything, reverse the order, reinstate the context, change the perspective
  • understanding of schemas: try to break the short-cuts of the mind to get more details
• lie detectors (cognitive neuroscience)

yes

• explains smoking/alcoholism
• application to psychoanalysis

no

• controversial
• sexist
• homophobic

• look into their past (childhood) to identify issues
• break down any conditions of worth
• given unconditional positive support and regard
• work towards closing the gap between actual self and ideal self
• increase self-esteem

• process information as a short-cut
• efficient way of handling information
• allow brain capacity for more important tasks
• help with a person's perception of the world

• looking at social learning
• made children (boys and girls) watch films of adults interacting with Bobo doll (attention and retention)
  • ignoring, playing or attacking
• children made to interact with the doll afterwards (motor reproduction)
• boys copied male behaviour, more than girls copied female behaviour
• boys copied aggression more than girls
• showed imitation of a model
• especially prominent when (in another study) adults were rewarded for their behaviour
  • vicarious reinforcement (motivation)

AO3

• unethical
• explains why there are a higher percentage of males in prison
• may be natural behaviour of participants (not socially learned)
• lab experiment may have caused demand characteristics
• underestimates biology (e.g testosterone of males)

• 4 general ethics
  • respect
  • competence
  • responsibility
  • integrity
• set by ethics committees
• cost-benefit approach

• aims to explain the limitations of the Behvaiourist and the Psychodynamic approach
• phenomenological
• how inidivuals perceive and interpret events (not behaviour or unconscious)
• rejects determinism of both

AO1

• Locke believed in purely nurture (humans are blank slates)
• Descartes believed in purely nature (characteristics caused by heredity)
• interactionist approach (influence each other)
• diathesis-stress model (Tienari)
• epigenetics (Dias and Ressler)

AO3

• interactionist approach means drugs and therapy used together
• hard to separate
• twin studies are unreliable
• animal studies are unethical and ungeneralisable
• implies that whatever the cause, mothers are to blame for their child's behaviour
• nature means we can use biology to keep psychology scientific

Burt

• IQ tests around the globe
  • no cultural relativism
  • leads to political views/racial discrimination
  • gives an idea of the distribution of westernised countries

Hamer

• did genetic studies on gay men
• correlated patterns in their DNA
• suggested that male sexuality was heavily influenced by genetics (have no choice in being gay) and gave survival advantages in evolution (surplus men)
  • is not very useful
  • helps fight the notion that being gay is 'giving in to the Devil' (religion)
  • gender bias

• can use empircal, objective methods to study it
• should be working towards a paradigm
• should be falsifiable
• can be replicated
• generate testable hypothesis

• commitment is based on satisfaction, investment and comparison with alternatives
• stay in relationship if we profit here more than in another relationship, including friendships
• a big investment size explains why couples stay together during dissatisfaction 
• intrinsic investments are things you've put directly into the relationship
• extrinsic investments are things you and your partner share in the relationship
• maintenance mechanisms is how commitment expresses itself
  • positive illusions, ridiculing of alternatives, forgiveness, accomodation

AO3

• not what arranged marriages are based on
• minimalises the role of love - cognitively and biologically
• explains why battered wives return to their husbands (Rusbult and Martz)
• contradicted by divorce (50% in the united states)
• correlation, not causation
• does not account for future plans
• a lot more subjective (less testable), but more valid to the behaviour of real relationships

• anisogamy = differences between male and female gametes
• short term = men have sex with many women to be able to impregnante as many as possible, to increase likelihood of success of fertilisation (their gametes allow them to do this)
• long term = women want age and success to be able to raise a supportive, successful family; men look for signs of fertility, if they are to settle down
• intrasexual selection is between members of the same sex competing for a mate
• intersexual selection is to do with mate choice
• women have a greater parental investment, as having offspring is a lot harder and more costly to them

AO3

• not a modern theory (based on Darwin's 19th century theories of natural selection)
• must be evolutionary, as chimpanzees do not experience high parental investment
• goes not apply to homosexual couples
• Kendrick found that teenage boys actually liked women up to 5 years older than them
• limits personal freedom
• some women do not want children or are unable to have children

• by Milgram
• exolaination of why people obey, after Milgram's study, and WWII events
• agentic state
  • binding factors
  • agentic shift
• autonomous state
• legitimacy of authority
  • hierarchial system
  • destructive authority

AO3

• agentic state supported by Milgram and Hofling's studies
• autonomous state supported by those in Milgram's study who did not conform
• autonomous state supported by Rank and Jacobson's study
• destructive authority supported by the events of My Lai (hierarchy of soldiers)
• Blass and Schmitt's students claimed that the fault was with Milgram's experimenters
• could be locus of control

• extranous variables
• confounding variables
  • e.g demand characteristics
• investigator effects

• operationalisation
• randomisation
• standardisation

INCLUDE

• hypothesis (& why)
• materials, quantify (& why)

• endogenous pacemakers are internal body clocks
• suprachiasmatic nucleus is the master oscillator for the sleep-wake cycle
• bundle of cells in the hypothalamus, above the optic chiasm
• receives information about light from the optic chiasm
• allows biological clock to adjust to information about light
• instructs the pineal gland to release melatonin so create tiredness

AO3

• Decoursey - destroyed the SCN in 30 chipmunks, causing them to die in the wild
• Ralph - injected SCN cells from mutant hamsters into the brains of normal hamsters, and their sleep-wake cycles synched up to the mutant hamsters' (20 hours)
• evidence is from individual case studiescase studies
• evidence is from animal studies (inethical and ungeneralisable)
• animal studies are under controlled conditions
• other factors, such as food - not just light
• Campell and Murphy - light shone on skin cells on the back of the knee shifted the sleep-wake cycle of participants; other peripheral oscillators

• correlational
• ordinal data
• looking at scattergrams
• any type of design

• hormone released from the adrenal gland
• increases heart rate, muscle tension, pupil dilation, respiration, sweating
• sympathomedullary pathey (sympathetic)
• prepares body for action
• increaes oxygen (blood) supply to skeletal muscle

AO1

• unconscious and unconscious behaviour
• tripartite structure of personality
• psychosexual stages of development
• defence mechanisms and internal conflict
• psychoanalysis

AO3

• negativity of psychodynamics vs. positivity of humanism
• repression and past experiences vs. present and future personal growth
• directive vs. non-directive approach
• determinism vs. free will

• faulty information processing
  • are addressed and CBT provides coping mechanisms
• irrational thinking interferes with everyday life by causing anxiety and depression
• Beck's negative triad
  • identify and break it with homework
• Beck's negative self-schemas
• Ellis's ABC model (activating events, beliefs, consequences)
• Ellis's 'musturbatory' (must-do) thoughts
  • Rational Emotive Behavioural Therapy (ABC + Dispute and Effect)
  • break irrational thought-depression bond

AO3

• depression can be cured with serotonin
• CBT does not allow you to look into your past (only future and goals)
• people with depression do not have the energy to go to therapy
• Alloy and Ambramson claimed that problems may be real and not curable
• Hammen and Krantz claimed depressed people has more errors in logic
• very expensive for NHS (underfunded and understaffed)

Nominal

• mode
• categories must be counted (frequency)

Ordinal

• median
• gaps between data are not even

Interval

• mean
• gaps between data are even

• name of researcher.
  • surname, forename.
• date.
• name of book/article,
• location:
• publisher.

Phonological loop

• phonological store
  • inner ear, speech perception
  • store info in an auditory form for 20-30 seconds
• articulatory control process
  • articulatory rehearsal of articulatory code
  • inner voice, speech production

Visuo-spatial sketchpad

• 3-4 chunks
• added to by Logie in 1995
  • visual cache
    • stores visual info
  • inner scribe
    • codes the orientation of visual info for navigation

KF

• studied by Shallice and Warrington
• motorcycle accident
• only had a digital (span) capacity of 2 items in his short term memory
• long term memory was unaffected
• auditory memory was a lot worse than his visual memory

HM

• operation to cure him of epilepsy caused amnesia
• inability to transfer short term memories to long term 

(Clive) Wearing

• musician who had brain damage on his hippocampus
• episodic amnesia
• could play piano and instruct a choir without having any memory of having learned how (music school)

• greater control over extraneous variables
• greater replicability (operationalise)
• study (with greater certainty) influence of cause and effect
• control over heat, light, noise, etc...

AO1

• explains a mental disorder
• explains how a behaviour forms
• method of gathering data
• development of laws, theories and principles
• scientific status 
• applications to therapy

• EEG is measuring general brain activity
• ERPs are elicited by specific stimuli presented

• limited sample size
• limited generalisability
• can not separate hemispheres as they usually interact
• artificial tasks
• contributed to mind-brain debates
• small sample sizes

• see if results are consistent
• correlate to past results (must be 0.8 positive)
• need to modify test if not at least +0.8
• statistical test using Spearman's rho (ordinal or data)

• matched pairs
• pre-test
• random allocation of matched pairs into each condition
• matched on age, gender, ethnicity...
• reduce potential sample bias

• babies' and parents reactions to each other
• responsiveness
• associated with secure attachments
• better relationship
• e.g waves responded with smiles

• categorical/nominal data
• testing for difference
• repeated measures
• each participant takes part in all conditions

• bad psychological health costs the  economy £15 billion a year
• Bowlby and Field's work into primary caregivers
• drug and CBT research help people get back to work
• 1/3 of absences are due to mental health
• investment from overseas companies for psychological research
• stress management programme
• research into biological rhythms to apply to better organised work shift
• debates on the impact of diet on health
• one million articles are submitted to scientific journals every year (must be checked for fraud)
• replicated research for theory construction

• participants are aware of being in an observation
• observer is clearly visible

• total observation time for each participant
• total number of observations
• each time interval is observation time divided by the number of observations

• participant gives information about their feelings/behaviours in and towards the study
• involves a questionnaire and/or interview
• can be closed and/or open questions

• long-term memory
• conscious
• factual and meaningful information

• Bowlby = attachment to primary caregiver provides IWM
• attachment is 'passed on' (continuity of attachment type)
• mental framework acts as a template for future relationships
• children use IWM to make relationships with their peers
• Kerns found that secure children had the best and most stable friendships
• McCarthy found that resistant children can not form friendships, and avoidants struggle with romantic relationships

• Mary Ainsworth, 1969
• in a controlled lab with 2-way mirror
• observation
• 3-minute observations
• exploration & secure-base, proximity, separation anxiety, stranger anxiety, reunion response.
• analysis lead to the suggestion of 3 types of attachment
• 8 conditions, varying in a combination of factors

• behaviour is influenced by conscious and unconscious thoughts
• schema are the mental representations of experience, knowledge and understanding
• models (computer model and information processing model) can be used to explain information processing
• cognitive experiments and observations require inferences, and are highly controlled
• cognitive neuroscience is the studying of biological processes and structures and understanding their relation to cognitive processes

AO3

• computer reductionism
• inferences may be subjective - not objective = not scientific
• schema can be explained by 2-way behaviourist model
• underexplains biology
• cognitive neurosciences has application to eye-witness testimonies
• CBT

• client must go away and record their expectations and feeling in a diary
• client's hypothesis is tested
• client must gather evidence for and against their thinking
• evaluate whether their thinking was correct or not
• gives client control and personal interaction within CBT

• pre-test
• participants are matched on their score or shared characteristic
• each goes into a separate condition
• reduces sample bias

• naturalistic
• non-artificial stimuli
  • stimuli that the target audience would regularly use (e.g key terms for students/names for parents)
• deception to avoid demand characteristics

• purpose of study
• length of study
• procedures
• right to withdraw
• reassurance of protection
• requirement of any psychological testing
• anonymity and confidentiality

• interviews
  • greater depth of response (more detail)
  • misunderstandings are explained
• diaries
  • prevents social desirability bias

• unlikely to be trained (need a train psychologist)
• rely on volunteer sampling/friends (unrepresentative)
• no ethical issues considered (no official informed consent)
• not as likely to operationalise the variables
• lack of controls